I'll probably be watching more of the series later, but wanted to review Liu Chang's roles in this short horror anthology first.
Series Premise: In a bustling district, a House of Wonders variety store has opened, where items, seemingly ordinary, each possess peculiar functions. The owner, Damon, has documented the instructions for use in the Wonders Notebook, allowing customers to select items based on their needs. People from all walks of life flock to the House of Wonders, each facing their own dilemmas and seeking ways to overcome them. However, in the end, they invariably discover that what truly resolves their issues isn't these strange and curious goods, but rather their own love and faith. -- TenCent Video synopsis.
ETA: I found out there was a fourth episode for Liu Chang that I managed to miss. Rectifying that and giving the episode titles and Liu Chang's character names.
Beneath the cut because as usual... LONG
(Also, SPOILERS!)
Episode 7: Memory Camera, Yu Sheng
Yu Sheng (Liu Chang) gets hold of a magic camera that shows the photographer and photographed person's memories. He and his girlfriend Lin, who both have amnesia thanks to an accident, make use of it to rediscover their relationship with each other. Except Lin realizes there's more to their memories than what Yu Shen is allowing her to see.
When she takes photos of Yu Shen covered in blood, she becomes suspicious of his motives and tries to run, only to learn that the memories the camera is showing her come from an attempted assault that she managed to escape by half-killing her foster father.
In the end, the couple decide they're best off making new, good, memories, than worrying too much about the past. They leave the camera with the proprietor of the House of Wonders and go off happily together, leaving the old memory of their amnesia behind.
This one is mostly a positive story. I'm not sure if the last scene was intended to suggest things weren't okay, but given the camera only takes pictures of the past, and the photograph Damon takes is something we already know, I'm not sure how it could be.
Damon, however, gets an ugly shock when he takes a blank photo of himself, so.... yeah.
Episode 18: Idol Drama Life, Gao Yuan
I didn't watch this one through because it hit all my cringe buttons. Liu Chang's character is a salary man who would love to be the hero in a romantic drama. His wish is granted suddenly when he finds the world stopped around him and a director demanding he behave in a certain way in order to win the love of a cold-hearted female CEO.
Unable to break out of the film crew's control, he does as he's told, even though he has no interest in said CEO and is actually in love with the little flower girl near his office. Following the script, he ends up marrying the CEO, who soon after dies for Reasons. At this point he thinks everything is a drama and believes the CEO is also acting, so doesn't feel any grief for her in his personal reality.
The script then allows him to fall in love with his flower girl, to his great pleasure. Except - unbeknownst to him - the flower girl is also an actress whose script has them falling in love and her inheriting the fortune he got from the CEO when he dies in two months.
I really didn't enjoy this one at all, though I did feel like there was plenty of meta to be had for Liu Chang and his struggles with romance drama/comedies. He doesn't handle them well, especially against perky little ingenues. I also didn't see a point where the character actually acquired an object from the House of Wonders, so his getting dragged into the mess doesn't seem fair.
Episode 21: Random Life, A-Qi
This one has one of my favorite time travel memes, although I sincerely hope the MC gets out of the problem in the end.
The main character finds himself fragmented through a month or so of time, waking without memory and sometimes injured. His only lifeline is a notebook he carries with him, showing the days he's lived in and hints as to what happened in his life. There's no notes past a certain date and he wonders if that means he's free of the mess after that day.
On one day he's killed by someone, only to wake up on another, much earlier day, with a note in his book in someone else's handwriting, telling him not to get into a taxi or leave his apartment. Afraid and angry, he instead goes to his taxi job and, somehow recognizing his enemy, takes him out in to the woods where they fight and he wins. We get a closeup of the enemy's necklace, with blue sand in a teeny hourglass.
He goes back home after burning all the evidence, then waits for midnight, hoping that ends the whole mess.
As it turns out, he visited the shop towards the beginning of the new year (I think the lunar new year) and is startled into breaking a red version of that hourglass, with the blue version right next to it. Damon tells him his time is fragmented now and that that shouldn't have been his in the first place. The enemy apparently buys the blue one at the same time.
As I noted earlier, one of my favorite memes is where one has to time travel into the past to cause something to happen in your future. In this case, we could be just facing the main character living the last days of his life out of order, of course. But that doesn't explain what the hourglasses are supposed to do and how they're supposed to be used.
I theorize that the blue hourglass lets the person involved avoid dying somehow and that he, knowing that the red hourglass owner will kill him on March 6th, tries to prevent it by threatening him. Instead, that threat ensures he does attack him.
This one's an open ending in my view. Liu Chang's character might die at the end, since he's killed (or at least attacked) on the last day of the notes. Or, because it is a magic hourglass, he'll continue waking up inside his scattered time and having to repeat everything he's done before. And, if so, maybe he'll be smart enough to work out what's going on and put a stop to that shit. (Being a Liu Chang stan, you can be sure I'm hoping for the last, no matter how bleak it might appear.)
Oh, I don't know if they did it on purpose, but the character's last day is April 14th, one day short of Liu Chang's actual birthday.
Episode 23: My False World, Zheng Tong
Wu Yong and his best friend (Liu Chang) are discussing false memories, where they recall things like a Pikachu with a black tail and Mickey Mouse in overalls. As they go about their day, though, Wu Yong realizes things are weird around him - he feels like people walk through him and like the world isn't right.
In order to determine if his best friend is a false memory, he takes Zheng Tong to the Strange Note's shop and uses a set of parallel mirrors which will only reflect a person infinitely if they're real. Zheng Tong turns out to be real, but when Wu Yong steps between the mirrors he realizes he's the one with no reflection.
As he disappears, Damon tells Zheng Tong that he's now cured of his delusion.
This one wasn't bad, if a bit obvious. One is left with an uncertainty (because of course) that the world Zheng Tong is in is real, but given the whole series is that trope, one pretty much expects it. It's a very short episode, but Liu Chang's whump expression does feature when his friend goes bye bye.
To Slenderman: How do you clean your clothes? I ask because your clothes don't seem to be something you could throw into a washing machine with them being so large, compared to human clothing.
Thank you @cosmiconix for your question.
You learn something new every day they say, but this is something I never knew 😀.
Any Q/A posts I make will be under the tag "Strange Notes", just be aware.
To Jeff & Liu: What's something that you've both individually done that you haven't told each other? Like a secret you never revealed. 😄
OMG Onix! Thank you for this question, this is the first real question I've gotten! Well, let's hear what they have to say.
Hmm, I wonder what Liu meant by that? Also people, please take Jeff's advice and don't smoke or vape, it is not a good thing for you, and it can hurt you. Take care of yourself 💖.
PS: Any Q/A posts I make will be under the tag "Strange Notes", just be aware 😉.
